The problem with every American candidate regarding the presidency, I am not talking only about this campaign or elections, but generally, that they say something during the campaign and they do the opposite after the campaign.

Any cooperation that doesn't go through the Syrian government is not legal. If it's not legal, we cannot cooperate with, and we don't recognize and we don't accept.

It started partly as a sectarian war in some areas, but now it's not, because when you talk about sectarian war or religious war, you should have a very clear line between the sects and religions in Syria according to the geography and the demography in Syria, something we don't have.

In reality, you cannot withstand for five years and more against all those countries, the West, and the Gulf states, the petrodollars, and all this propaganda, the strongest media corporations around the world, if you don't have the support of your own people. That's against the reality.

[Hezbollah forces] cannot exist all over Syria anyway, for many reasons, but they exist on the borders.

I have to be very clear and very honest. I'm not asking [ the American officials] to believe if they don't want to believe. This is reality, I'm telling you the reality from our country. We live here, we know what is happening, and they have to listen to people here. They cannot listen only to their media or to their research centers. They don't live here ; no one lives here but us.

In the initiative that we issued at the beginning of year 2013 we said every party with no exceptions as long as they give up their armaments.